Having a friend who owns and runs a phone shop, has probably spoilt me a little bit. He allows me to exchange my phones with him at a very low price, and sometimes even free. So I am always changing my phones. I do love my phones, and my choice of make is without a doubt Nokia. I have had all the other makes, but the one feature Nokia has wg=hich I love is being able to lock your keypad with a code. Cell phones have become so much part our lives that, we store a lot of personal information and not just phone numbers. So I like to make sure I have all the security I can have. 

I recently upgraded my phone from Nokia N96 to 5800 XpressMusic. I was just facinated by the touch screen feature being used with many of the new phones. But now that I have it, I am not sure I actually like it. I mean there are ceratin things which have been improved or added to the 5800, but is it user friendly? 

N96 and 5800 are two of the most widely desirable phones in the Nokia series. These two handsets, with their advanced options and excellent entertainment scopes have created widespread fuss among buyers. Both of them have distinctive features which are very much different from each other. For example, N96 a slide phone with a 5 magapixel camera (fantastic quality pictures) while the 5800 is a touchscreen, with auto turn off and auto rotate options.

I previously owned the N96 and now have the 5800 XpressMusic. I just wanted a change from the normal keypads and try the touchscreens. Do I regret it now? Well having lost some of the things I loved about my Nokia N96, I miss it. But I think this happens with many of the phones we use, as with time you get use to the features and then you can’t live without them. I will discuss this further later on.

However, both of them support excellent network connections. In fact, they support both 2G as well as 3G networks, which guarantee consistent connectivity, no matter, where you go. This feature has attracted various professional, who usually have to travel for business purposes. Even with normal people, now that calling abroad or calling home from when on a vacation/holiday has become very cheap. Other than this, the fast Wi-Fi Internet connection has also become popular with people who love being online.

One of the features, or shall I say I am finding difficult getting used to is writing text messages (SMS) with my 5800 XpressMusic on the move. I mean when I had my N96, it had the buttons which I could use and knew where each one was without looking (all the text messages I have been sending), so therefore I could write a text message while I was walking, eating, talking, to put it simply, anywhere, doing anything. But with my latest and my first touchscreen, I am unable to do that now. When I try and write a message, I find my little stick which comes with the phone (you can use your fingers too) keeps slipping and ends up hitting the wrong letter. I find it so irritating as sometimes it is far much easier to just send a text message to someone, instead of having to call them.

There is one feature that a lot of the 5800 XpressMusic owners (including a few of my friends) may not know of is, when your phone rings, if it’s on ringing that is and you wish to ignore it but don’t want to hear it ring, all you have to do is turn the phone upside down and leave it on the desk/table. It automatically goes onto silent mode. It was very useful for me on a couple of occasions when I forgot to switch it off while in a meeting at work. So I find that a very good feature to have.

The N96 however had a great picture quality, and the video quality was brilliant too. I perosnally love capturing the good moments in life with my camera, and I certainly miss the quality now, it saved me carryiing a camera or a camcorder with me.

So what do I think about both the phones? They are both brilliant and are good in their own field. They both have their good and bad features, but you will defiantly have to compromise with certain features. However, most importantly both the phones have very big memory and are expandable. And let’s not forget, it was designed for music and videos and the both do a brilliant job.

If you are still complaining, then lets not forget, their main purpose is to make a call, so you should be happy if that’s still the case, because I am. But I have to say out of the two, I prefer the N96. 

The other phones to look out for are the N97 Mini, X3 and X6. Read my hub on X6, my next possible phone.

Below I have listed the specifications for both of them for further comparison to help you make the choice.

· Talk time 2.5 hours
· Standby time 200 hours
· Camera, Camera resolution 5-megapixel, Camera flash LED
· Connectivity
· Networks GSM 850, GSM 1800, GSM 1900, UMTS 2100 Connectivity
· Bluetooth, 802.11b, Wi-Fi, 3G, HSDPA
· Data services GPRS, WAP, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA
· USB connectivity
· Display
· Main display: Screen resolution 320 x 240 pixels
· Main display: Number of colours 16 million
· Entertainment
· Video player
· Games
· FM radio
· Music player
· Functionality
· Input method Numerical keypad
· Ringtone options Monophonic, Polyphonic, and MP3
· Java
· Operating system Series 60
· Supported audio file formats AAC, AAC+, MP3, and WMA
· Supported video file formats MPEG-4, Real Video; WMV Supported picture file format JPG
· Video calls
· Web browser
· Phone type 3G, Multimedia, Music, Smartphone, Imaging, TV, GPS, Gaming
· Form factor Slider
· Availability Optus, Vodafone, 3 Mobile
· Dimensions (W x D x H) 103 x 18 x 55 mm
· Weight 125 g
· Internal memory 16000 MB
· Expansion slot microSD
· Messaging
· Messaging options SMS, MMS, E-mail, Instant Messaging, Push e-mail, IM
· E-mail protocols IMAP4, SMTP

3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics, auto focus, 4x digital zoom and double LED flash

Video recording (up to 640 x 480 pixels and up to 30 fps), 4x digital video zoom, front camera for 3G video calling

Display: Touchscreen, 16.7 million colours, 640 x 360 pixels (3.2 inches) with automatic display rotation

Series music player (MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA formats) with 8-band graphical equaliser

FM radio with Visual Radio

Stereo loudspeakers

Ringtones: MP3 & video ringtones, 64-voice polyphonic ringtones, vibration alert

Voice commands: speaker independent dialling and voice commands

Voice recorder (digital stereo microphone)

Integrated handsfree speaker

Games: 3D Bounce and Global Race

Messaging: SMS, MMS, email (support for IMAP, POP, SMTP) plus attachments, Audio messaging

Advanced Series 60 personal organiser functions, Flash Lite 3.0

Integrated GPS with Nokia Maps

Internet: HSCSD, GPRS, EDGE, 3G HSDPA (3.6 Mbps), XHTML web browser

Connectivity: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, 3.5 mm audio jack, TV-Out

Memory: 81 Mbytes plus 8GB microSD memory card (up to 16 GB supported)

Flight mode

Quadband (GSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz) plus 3G (WCDMA 900/2100 MHz)

Size: 111 x 52 x 15.5 mm

Weight: 109g

Talk time: 5 hours (3G) - 8.8 hours (2G)

Battery standby: 400 hours

Music playback: up to 35 hours